Introducing Val Shields Val Shields Worked in highly

Introducing Val Shields

Val Shields Worked in highly competitive, national, listed companies Work in medium to large companies ensuring marketing spend delivers return on investment, working closely with Finance to ensure profitability Consumer focused - ingraining a “customer first” ethos throughout the organisation Shift organisations from inward to outward looking – competitor awareness and market focussed Sharpening and simplifying marketing messages Identifying, segmenting and targeting customers for growth potential Delivering market share and business growth Digital transformation – collaborating with Operations, IT, Finance, HR - prepare businesses for the future

My Specialties Strategic Thinking / Big Picture Marketing Business & Marketing Plans Growth Strategies – and the importance of market share Curiosity – applying a mix of curiosity, instinct and experience, to explore ideas and build strategies Interpreting data to form strategies and competitive advantage - Big Data / Insight / Analytics Communications – print, digital & internal Research Customer experience Brand positioning ROI of marketing spend Mentoring Collaboration

Sector experience Food Sport & leisure Drink Education Retail Services Manufacturing Distribution Media Foodservice

Experience gained in: Argyll Stores Ltd - £ 778 m turnover (1983) ASDA Stores Ltd - £ 4. 3 bn turnover (1992) The Victoria Wine Co (1, 000+ branches nationwide) Regional Independent Media – £ 450 m turnover (1995) Moorland Foods – manufacturing subsidiary of Hillsdown Holdings Trusty Crust Organic Bakery – manufacturing, wholesale & retail East Lothian Council - public sector finance and budgeting Enjoy Leisure Ltd – CRM, database & digital marketing Mc. Sence Communications - social enterprise and services

Marketing Courses – Developed & Delivered Marketing Planning for Regional Newspapers Marketing Planning for Editors Marketing Planning for Advertising Sales Marketing Planning for Newspaper Promotions Business Planning & Marketing Planning (for Senior Managers) Sales Master Class (for national sales team) Marketing Support for Sales Success New Product Development Customer Journey / Customer Experience (developed for Enjoy Leisure)

I could support your business growth if: You are looking to enter a new growth phase Your current marketing is too short term, or tactical You have not got a marketing plan which is aligned to your business KPIs Your Marketing Plan is not rigorously challenged at each management meeting You are not achieving ROI on your marketing spend Your marketing personnel lack all-round marketing skills You’ve not got a consumer champion within your organisation Your marketing operation does not have the gravitas of other functions like Finance or Operations Your marketing operation is currently organised in silos and no one is looking at the bigger picture You need a marketer who understands profitability and commerce

Data transformation Are you maximising data? My experience of using data to transform organisations: Big data development at Argyll Stores – exploiting first bar code data to identify best and poorest products across multi facia (Presto, Liptons, Templetons & Galbraiths), nationally. ASDA – identifying with IT how to access sales data, by line, by store. Applying this to aid supplier negotiations, range, store layouts ASDA – identifying market share / market growth by sector – strategy building and implementation ASDA - collaborating with largest UK research agencies (Kantar / Nielsen) to set up till roll data project – opening up unprecedented access to consumer purchase behaviour RIM – instigated market share / growth for benchmarking group-wide – using this to build newspaper content, advertising platforms, new product development Enjoy leisure – collaborated with IT to gain access to EPOS database - leading to segmentation & targeted advertising, product packages, membership growth & retention; introduced Management Info Dashboard – management access to trends at a glance in graph format for planning fitness classes, gym memberships, significantly increasing website traffic, segmenting audiences for email marketing

Leveraging data to: Reduce range - savings on stock holding, range rationalisation, space re-allocation, 7 figure improvements in sales and profits (Argyll Stores) Improve margin, better data for supplier negotiations; sharper advertising and communications through market segmentation (ASDA) Prioritise growth sectors for own label development, store layouts, press and TV advertising (ASDA) Equip sales force with professional, factual sales data to increase sales and profitability through initiating biennial readership surveys and introducing use of TGI / FES (RIM) Change editorial emphasis on content and strengthen advertising platforms (RIM) Develop customer relationships, targeted advertising – less wastage & identifying new sports activities to increase revenues and user numbers x 4 (Enjoy Leisure) Forecast future usage of sports facilities & plan capital investment (Enjoy Leisure)

Business & Marketing Planning Aligned to business KPIs Ensure, or identify KPIs that deliver results Researching, preparing and implementing marketing / business plans to increase sales – ASDA, RIM, Enjoy Leisure Introduced marketing planning in large organisations – RIM Implementation of plans – regular reporting to senior management, linking marketing activities to business performance and profitability 7 fold growth in turnover and significant margin improvement in new sectors Bakery Despite reduced budget, still delivered services and came in below budget – East Lothian Council

Contact me - Val Shields: For help with business growth To lead organisational change and digital transformation by exploiting untapped information To tap into my experiences gained across varying sectors and company sizes To leverage your data to give competitive advantage To work with someone who is naturally curious and thinks “big picture” A commercial marketer who understands the whole business – across Finance, Operations, IT, HR Someone who challenges the status quo and current thinking val_shields@hotmail. com